Trudy
by PippinDuck
Summary: A streamofconsciousness piece concerning 16 year old Trudy Calavicci in the mental institution, written from her POV. No infringement against copyright held by UniversalBelisarius. written Oct. 1996


"Trudy"  
  
by Jennifer L. Rowland  
  
She looked out the window and watched the snow drift lazily down to  
  
the earth. She would have liked to reach out and touch it, maybe catch a  
  
flake or two on her tongue, but even if she could get the old, rusty window  
  
mechanism to work, the bars in front of the spotty glass wouldn't let her  
  
through. Still, it was pretty to watch, and she amused herself with  
  
remembered stories of Jack Frost as the ice formed patterns that were barely  
  
visible through the soiled windowpanes.  
  
Jack Frost, and she instantly saw her Uncle Jack. Funny, Uncle Jack  
  
usually came to visit. But she hadn't seen him lately. Not that she could  
  
really keep track of days, but she did remember that things weren't so white  
  
the last time he'd come. In fact, she was pretty sure there had been  
  
flowers. Yes, there had been flowers when Uncle Jack came. He'd taken her  
  
for a walk in the gardens. She loved the flowers, especially the daisies.  
  
It was a shame, she'd said, the daisies weren't growing well this year. It  
  
didn't matter that she was just repeating what she'd heard Miss Kishner say,  
  
Uncle Jack smiled and agreed with her as if she were....what had he called  
  
her? Oh, yes, a grand botyniss. At any rate, she wished it was flower time  
  
again. She always felt better when she saw the flowers.  
  
She coughed and rubbed her nose miserably. She was certain that if  
  
she had some flowers to look at now she'd feel better. Maybe Uncle Jack  
  
would bring her some. He hadn't made it to see her the last two times the  
  
flowers had come. But that was all right. Uncle Jack was a very important  
  
man. And important men were always busy, and they couldn't always come see  
  
you because they were so busy doing important things.  
  
Poppy was always busy. He was so busy that he'd even gone to  
  
someplace called Saw Dee A Ray Bee Uh to do important things. But he was  
  
going to come back with lots of money. Al had told her that. And he did  
  
come back. Poppy had come and gotten her and Al out of the big, big house  
  
with all the kids who had no mommies or daddies. She knew better, though.  
  
Al made sure of that. They *did* have a daddy, and he was coming back for  
  
them. They weren't orphans, he told her over and over again. Al never  
  
talked about Mommy, and eventually she'd stopped asking about her. Poppy  
  
was the important one. He was the one they could count on.  
  
She turned around and looked at the great room she was in. It was a  
  
huge room, but she had to share it with lots and lots of people. In the  
  
house Poppy had bought when he came back, she had had her own room, and she  
  
even had toys--new toys, not broken ones. They didn't have good toys here.  
  
All the toys here had slobber on them and were broken or missing parts. She  
  
couldn't even do a puzzle, because none of the puzzles had all the pieces.  
  
So she usually ended up just looking out the window.  
  
She looked at the snow again. It was pretty, but it was so cold.  
  
The cold sneaked in through the window and made everything cold. Her bed  
  
was right below the window, and no matter how many blankets Miss Kishner  
  
gave her, they all turned to ice and she shivered all night long. And when  
  
she got cold, her cough got worse. Dr. Young had checked her with that  
  
awful cold stetherscope, and made tut-tut noises, and told her to drink  
  
plenty of juice and everything would be fine. She just had a winter cold,  
  
he said. Dr. Young was very smart, so she always made sure to drink all of  
  
her juice, and sometimes even asked for a second glass. Miss Kishner  
  
usually obliged her, but when Miss Forrest was there, she fussed at her for  
  
being greedy. And so she would have to make do with just one glass, no  
  
matter what Dr. Young said. But that was all right. She really didn't  
  
mind. Miss Forrest was just trying to make sure that she knew how important  
  
it was to share.  
  
What she did mind was that they'd cut her hair off. She touched the  
  
rough cropped edges and sighed. She just couldn't comb it herself, and they  
  
didn't have time to fix it for her. Even Miss Kishner had gotten tired of  
  
yanking at the tangles. So, she guessed it was a long time ago, even though  
  
she remembered it as vividly as if it had been yesterday, she'd been taken  
  
down the hallway where they took you when you were bad. She'd been so  
  
scared. She'd tried very hard to follow the rules, but sometimes one of the  
  
others would just make you so upset you couldn't help but cry. And then  
  
there had been the one time when she'd had a bad dream and wet the bed, but  
  
she hadn't done that in the longest time, so she didn't understand why she  
  
was being taken to the Bad Place. They'd put her in a big, hard chair and  
  
told her to sit very still. Of course she had, especially when they took  
  
out the scissors. Somehow she'd managed not to start screaming. Then a  
  
hand pushed her head down and she felt the cold metal on the back of her  
  
neck. In a few minutes, all she felt was air, and her head was raised.  
  
They took a towel and wiped her neck and then told her to stand up. When  
  
she stood up, she saw her hair all over the floor. She couldn't help it.  
  
She started to cry.  
  
She touched the short hair again. She was sort of used to it now,  
  
and she didn't think she looked funny when she looked in the mirror anymore,  
  
but nobody told her she was pretty anymore. Not even Miss Kishner. She  
  
wondered what Al would say about her hair. Al never teased her. But he  
  
would probably miss her hair, she thought. When they were in the big, big  
  
house, and even after Poppy came back, Al would brush her hair for her. A  
  
hundred times, he said. Every night he'd sit on the edge of her bed and  
  
take her favorite hairbrush and brush her hair, counting each pull of the  
  
brush. That was what the movie stars did, he'd told her. That was why  
  
their hair was so long and pretty. She wanted hair like the movie stars,  
  
and so she didn't complain, not even when Al had to pull hard to get out a knot.  
  
She missed Al. She knew he would be different. She had an old  
  
photograph of herself and Al and Poppy, and when she looked in the mirror  
  
she knew that she looked different than the little girl in the picture.  
  
That meant Al wasn't the little boy in the picture. And Poppy. Poppy would  
  
never change. Poppy was in Heaven, Al said. She wasn't so sure about that.  
  
She'd seen Poppy taking a nap in that funny-looking bed in the church, and  
  
then they'd closed the lid. She'd guessed that was so he wouldn't get woken  
  
up; he looked like he really wanted the nap. She wanted to ask Al, but he  
  
was so quiet. He just sat next to her with a frown on his face. Uncle Jack  
  
had been crying, and she wanted to tell him not to be sad, that Poppy was  
  
just taking a long nap. But then she and Al had taken a ride in a shiny  
  
black car that stopped in a stone garden. That's what it looked like, but  
  
Al had told her it was a semmerterry. The strange bed with a lid had been  
  
put in a hole in the ground and they started to throw dirt on it. That's  
  
when she'd started screaming. And that's when Al told her again that Poppy  
  
was in Heaven. She didn't understand how he could be in the strange bed and  
  
in Heaven at the same time, but Al knew a lot, so she listened to him. She  
  
didn't think Poppy would be happy when he woke up with dirt all over him,  
  
though.  
  
Al hadn't been happy, either. He'd held on to her, hugging her, and  
  
she'd watched as two tiny tears rolled down his cheeks. She noticed that he  
  
didn't bow his head with everyone else when the priest started to pray, and  
  
she wanted to ask him, but she didn't. Not even when they left Poppy in the  
  
ground.  
  
She looked at the ground outside her window. It was covered with  
  
white. She coughed again. Miss Kishner came up to her and put a hand on  
  
her forehead. "You've got a fever," she said, and pulled down the covers on  
  
the bed. "Come over here and get into bed."  
  
With a sigh, she left the window and walked to her bed. The sheets  
  
were like ice and she gasped when she lay down. The gasp started her  
  
coughing again. Now that she was lying down she could feel a heaviness in  
  
her chest. She started shivering when Miss Kishner pulled the cold blankets  
  
over her shoulders. She didn't know why she was so tired. She shouldn't be  
  
tired. It wasn't like she had run around the room. Not like Frances.  
  
Frances was strange. She drooled and she wet the bed and she was mean.  
  
Frances liked to pull hair. She put her hand to her head and felt the small  
  
bald spot from the time, not too long ago, when Frances had caught her and  
  
pulled her hair out. That was the only time she'd ever hit someone. She'd  
  
hit Frances so hard that red started to come out of her nose. They'd  
  
brought her to the Bad Place after that. Frances had to go to the Bad  
  
Place, too, but not at the same time. She didn't like the Bad Place. It  
  
was scary and it hurt. It hurt so bad it made her cough worse. It made her  
  
feel bad.  
  
She didn't like feeling bad. She felt bad right now. She tilted  
  
her head back and looked up through the window, past the bars, to the sky.  
  
It was grey, but she could still see the clouds. It had stopped snowing and  
  
the clouds were changing. One of them looked like a flower, and she smiled.  
  
She tried to sigh, but couldn't get a deep enough breath. No matter. She'd  
  
just look at the flower. But it was already changing. Now it was a dog.  
  
She liked dogs. Poppy had promised to get them a dog, but then he'd gotten  
  
sick. And then, after they'd left him in the ground, or he'd gone to Heaven  
  
(she still wasn't sure where he was), some people in very dark clothes had  
  
come to their house. They'd taken Al away in one car, and put her in  
  
another. That was when she'd been brought to the first big place with bars  
  
on the windows. She didn't like being away from Al, but the nuns were very  
  
nice there. They read her stories about Jesus every night and told her how  
  
she must be a good girl. She tried very hard to be a good girl, but she  
  
must not have been good enough, because when she got older, they brought her  
  
to a new place with bars on the windows, and another, until finally she'd  
  
ended up here, with the beds that got cold in the winter.  
  
But, she thought, the good thing about this place was that this was  
  
the place where Uncle Jack had first come to visit her. He'd been so happy  
  
to see her and gave her a tight hug, so tight she could hardly breathe. She  
  
felt like she was in a tight hug right now, only nobody was hugging her.  
  
She closed her eyes and pretended that Uncle Jack was hugging her. Then she  
  
rolled over and looked at the battered picture on her nightstand. Uncle  
  
Jack had brought it on one of his visits. He was going to find Al, he said,  
  
even though Al wasn't a little boy anymore. Al was a young man. But he was  
  
going to find Al, and then Al would be able to come visit. She'd been very  
  
happy to hear that. She knew Al would look different, but she couldn't help  
  
but see the little boy in the photograph whenever she thought about him.  
  
She hoped that Uncle Jack had found Al, and maybe that was why Uncle Jack  
  
couldn't come visit her anymore.  
  
She coughed again. She was getting tired. She tried to remember  
  
some of the stories about Jesus that the nuns had taught her. She  
  
remembered her favorite, about how Jesus had made all the grown-ups move  
  
aside and let the children come to be with Him. Maybe she was big now, but  
  
she would have liked to be one of those children. "Can I come be with You?"  
  
she asked out loud. Nobody in the room heard her speak.  
  
She rolled onto her back and realized someone was standing next to  
  
her bed. It was Poppy. She smiled and started to squeal in excitement, but  
  
it turned into a hacking cough. He smiled back at her and reached out his  
  
hand. He wasn't covered in dirt, so Al must have been right. He must have  
  
been in Heaven.  
  
She took his hand and felt lighter than air. She didn't cough  
  
anymore and she didn't feel bad. She followed him out of the building and  
  
up through the air. Up to a place where the flowers never stopped growing,  
  
not even for an instant. 


End file.
